Alsace-Lorraine is impervious to those ideas. Against her will, she was torn from France and she wishes to return. It is this which makes clear her history from 1871 to this day.
As soon as it was a question of the necessity of giving up a part of the territory, all the deputies of the threatened departments signed a declaration, February 17, 1871, which, among other passages, contained the following: "Alsace and Lorraine do not wish to be alienated. Associated for more than two centuries with France, both in good and bad fortune, these two provinces, exposed without intermission to the blows of the enemy, have constantly sacrificed themselves for the greatness of the nation; they have sealed with their blood the insoluble compact which binds them to France. Made doubtful by the claims of the enemy, they assert, through all the obstacles and all the dangers under the yoke even of the invader, their unshaken fidelity. Unanimously the citizens in their homes, the soldiers who rallied beneath the flag, those who voted and those who fought, all signified to Germany and to the world the immutable will of Alsace and of Lorraine to remain French."
March 1, 1871, the same deputies signed a new protest which they deposited at the bureau of the National Assembly in which we find the following announcement: "We declare once more null and void a pact which disposes of us without our consent. The claim to our rights always remains open to each and to all in the form and the measure that our conscience dictates to us."
When the Alsatians were permitted by Germany to send deputies to the Reichstag, the fifteen who were elected protested on their side against annexation February 18, 1874. We find in their declaration the following passage: "In choosing us all, just as we are, our electors before everything else wish to affirm their sympathy with France and their right to govern themselves." These solemn declarations have never been revoked by any equivalent or contrary statement. Not even during the actual war and reign of terror established in the annexed provinces has the German Government succeeded in forcing from the representatives of Alsace-Lorraine a statement expressing the desire to remain German. The attempt to make such a manifestation by the votes of the council-generals, of whom the suspected members had previously been deported to Germany, saying that the economic interest of Alsace-Lorraine necessitated the maintenance of the _status quo_, only served to demonstrate the insecurity of the political situation of the German Empire in Alsace-Lorraine. What lamentable drivel in comparison to the dignified and generous language of the magnificent protests of Bordeaux. It accords well with the philosophy of German diction which the Baron de Bulach, Secretary of State, jeeringly dared recommend to his compatriots as a line of conduct: "_Wess Brod ich ess des Lied ich sing_" (Whose bread I eat, his song I sing).